I stopped to stare at these supercutewedgesthatarereallyinrightnow, the ones that come in that weird peachy crayola color that fashion bloggers have started calling "nude" - we'll ignore both the inherent white privilege in declaring a peachy shade of Caucasian The Color of Nudity and also that my own experience of nudeness does not involve anything close to that color but sure.
I hadn't realized how dark it had gotten outside or that I might not be the only person in the world who hates feeling lost when I heard a small, worried voice.
"Mooommm?"
He was probably seven. Six, maybe. His eyes were large (or maybe they just seemed large because he looked so panicky).
"Mom?" He was running a little to catch up with her as she headed for the registers.
"Mmhmm..." she said, not looking at him, or at anything in particular.
"Um, do you know how to get home from here?"
Her eyes darted down at him and he grabbed her hand.
"Yeah, honey," she said.
"Okay."
I kept walking, trying hard not to bring my hand up to feel the squeeze inside my chest cavity.
Maybe that's why I really hate the dark. Maybe I just always thought I'd get to this point on my life-map where being an adult would stop being deeply, deeply terrifying. Somewhere along the line - and I honestly can't remember when this happened - someone determined that I was legally capable of driving my car without calling home every hour and paying my bills and deciding if I was going to eat ice cream for dinner and finding my own way home in the dark. I guess I just haven't gotten over that tiny panic that I'm not old enough to be doing this, that I don't really know how to get home from anywhere, at all.
